IPS: Major teams strengthen back-room support.

One beneficiary of the current squeeze in the IRL IndyCar Series is the supporting Indy Pro Series, whose teams are making rich pickings of the engineers and mechanics that suddenly find themselves surplus to requirements on the main tour.

With Target Chip Ganassi Racing, Panther Racing and Cheever Racing all slimming their IRL efforts by one car this year, many IPS teams are boosting their efforts by hiring very experienced crew members. Among the teams with new hires in 2006 are AFS Racing, Michael Crawford Motorsports, Playa Del Racing and Sam Schmidt Motorsports.

"We have some really great guys on our crew right now," said AFS Racing driver Arie Luyendyk Jr, a veteran of 41 Indy Pro Series starts. "A few of them are from (Target Chip) Ganassi, a few of them have come over from Champ Car. It's a pretty solid team."

Gary Penission is the crew chief and team manager for AFS Racing. Penission most recently worked for Target Chip Ganassi Racing on the sports car side and also on Ryan Briscoe's IndyCar Series effort. He was part of Greg Ray's IndyCar Series championship effort in 1999.

"The Indy Pro Series started out with guys that couldn't get on with an IndyCar Series team," Penission said. "From when it started to now, it has come quite far. You can notice that just by looking around. The teams, haulers, crews, everything looks more professional."

Penission brought along two other Ganassi employees with him. Andrew Koers and Kenneth Natalie each had spent at least four seasons with the team.

Upstart Michael Crawford Motorsports hired six crew members with experience from Target Chip Ganassi Racing, Panther Racing, Dreyer & Reinbold Racing and Forsythe Championship Racing.

Sam Schmidt Motorsports brought in Grant Bentrud from Herdez Racing to be the chief mechanic for Jaime Camara. They also hired two crew members from Panther Racing.

"Any time you have very professional mechanics and engineers on board from a higher series, it brings the calibre of racing up," Luyendyk said. "I think the Pro Series has reached a level to where you can't get by with mechanics who aren't very professional and have good backgrounds, so I think it's good for the series. It shows that the series is strong and that you need the hire the best people to do the best job because of the competitiveness."